


243 - Mini Summery Cuddle Fic

by storiesaboutvan



Category: Catfish and the Bottlemen (Band)
Genre: F/M, Fluff, Mini Fic, Reader-Insert
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-01-12
Updated: 2019-01-12
Packaged: 2019-10-08 17:10:02
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,796
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/17390327
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/storiesaboutvan/pseuds/storiesaboutvan
Summary: Filling the prompt “a short fic where van and the reader are just cuddling and making out? like super chill but detailed. i think you’ve written something similar but i absolutely loved it!!”





	243 - Mini Summery Cuddle Fic

The air conditioner was an unremarkable thing. Just an off-white rectangle attached to the wall, high up out of your reach. Whenever it was due for cleaning, it had to be Van's job. If he was away, it didn't get cleaned. You watched the air conditioner as it pumped out crisp, cool air. The blade slowly swayed side to side, circulating the flow across the living room the best it could. Really, you needed to get whole house ducted aircon. That, though, seemed like a very adult move. A renovation to a house?! God, no. Not on your watch. Not on Van's.

"Love? Did you hear me?"

His whispering voice drew your attention; you looked over to where he was sitting cross legged on the floor, only a metre from the television screen. He was mid-game of Fifa and had been at it all morning. Morning. It was only 10… or 11… How could it be that hot already?

Van glanced over his shoulder at you.

"Sorry. What?"

"Tea," he said, still in a whisper and eyes glued to the screen. "Do you want some iced tea?"

"Why are you whispering?"

"I… don't know," he said, voice returning to normal. There was a thickness in the air. The summer heat. The background white noise of the air conditioner. A something that forced Van into one of his quiet, dreamy moods.

In reply, you made a laughing sound halfway between a snort and a huff. "Tea sounds good. I'll get it,"

"No!" Van quickly called, pausing his game and standing before you could even sit up. "I will. You stay there under the aircon. Keep staring off inta' space like ya do." 

And with a kiss to your forehead, Van left the room.

Staring off into space like you do. He wasn't wrong. 

The sound of Van's bare feet sticking to the linoleum kitchen floor. Fridge door. You could image the burst of chilled air hitting Van. He'd make an audible 'ahhhh' sound. Glasses being pulled from the cupboard and iced tea being poured. The night before, when neither of you could sleep, you made two pitchers of iced tea while Van laid on the kitchen floor sweating and complaining. Fridge door closed. Van's feet. And there he was again.

You sat up and took the glass he held out. Instead of returning to his game, Van moved your legs to sit down on the couch where you were stretched out. Aiming to reposition yourself so that he'd not have to hold your legs and endure the additional body heat, you began to move but Van took hold of your legs and put them back out flat across his. Complacent in that and without energy to vocalise otherwise, you settled back down and drank through the bendy straw.

"Fancy," you said, twirling the straw. Van smiled and nodded. His glass was without a straw and it was empty within the minute.

Glass still in hand, Van closed his eyes and rested his head back on the couch. You were both in the direct path of the air conditioner. Besides it's buzzing, you couldn't hear anything else. It was just you, the love of your life, and your lord and saviour Fujitsu Split System. 

You watched Van, watched his eyes move minimally beneath the lids. Watched his hands lightly move up and down your legs. When was the last time you shaved? Eh. You didn't care and neither did Van. All those types of culture-induced new-relationship anxieties died a long time ago. In their wake was an easy comfort and dazzling lack of self-consciousness.

"I love you," you told him.

His eyes opened and his head rolled to face you. He studied your expression; his eyes flicked from feature to feature. Then, a small smile and a sigh. "I love you too."

A sudden silence ripped you from each other's gaze. "Oh no," you said, looking at the blank television screen. Van stood and tried all the buttons. The light switch. All of it.

"I'll go check the main switch thing," he said. You shuddered. Adult task.

Van returned quickly with a solemn look on his face.

"I messaged around. Reckon there's a blackout. Too many aircons on or somethin'," you said. Van nodded and put his hands on his hips. He didn't mean to look so dramatic, but it still made you giggle.

"What?" he asked. You shrugged and giggled some more. "Ya all laughs now. Wait for an hour when this place turns into an oven."

The lounge room maintained its comfortable temperature for more than hour, but when the sun was at its highest in the sky and the afternoon was at its peak, you were sweating bullets.

"Help," you whispered. Van was starfished out on the floor, doing his best to stay perfectly still and not die in the heat. He did not acknowledge your call for aid. Trying again you said, "Van? Ryan? Ryan Evan McCann? Help. 911!"

"Ain't even the number here,"

"Help," you repeated. He opened his eyes, sat up and looked at you. He frowned and crawled over to press the back of his hands to your bright red cheeks.

"Come on. Got an idea," he ordered, standing and motioning for you to follow him.

As you crossed one side of the house to the other, you discovered just how brutal the heat was. The hallway was particularly bad with its thick carpet and lack of ventilation. By the time Van closed the bathroom door behind you both, you felt faint. It was a journey that took less than a minute, but it took its toll on you. You sat down on the cool-ish tiles of the bathroom floor. Van turned the tap on for the bath and looked for the plug.

"Don't want a bath! Hot!" you muttered.

"If ya use hot water, yeah. Have to be a bit thick to do that, love. Cold water but. Just like a mini swimming pool, innit?"

You looked up at him and his proud grin. It was all teeth. The bunny rabbit front ones that the rest of his face had grown into as he had gotten older. The little vampire ones that you only noticed if you looked hard enough. Crooked but charming. Off-white, but not like the air conditioner.

"Swimming pool," you repeated and Van nodded. "Do we wear swimmers?"

"I'm not, but you can do what you want," he replied, taking off his underwear and stepping into the bath. It was all he was wearing to begin with.

"How is it?" you asked, smirking. You could see the cold water was a shock to his system.

"Ah… Good…" he lied. "Maybe don't just sit all the way in though, when you come in."

Stripping and stepping in, you sat on the edge of the bath and slowly made your way in over the course of a few minutes. Once in, you felt like you could breathe again. Van's back was pressed to the north side of the bath and yours was to the south. He had his legs either side of you and yours were stretched out in the middle, your feet flat on his chest.

"This was a good idea," you said.

"You're welcome," he replied.

There would be no way of knowing if the power had come back on, but it didn't much matter. In the cold bath water and with Van, you were comfortable and calm. For a long time, longer than either of you would have guessed, you stayed silent, both daydreaming of each other and swirling around in the water. Then, Van spoke quietly.

"Babe? Come 'ere."

You opened your eyes and looked at him. He hadn't made any sort of movement or motion for you to follow, but you knew what he wanted. Spinning around on the spot, you gently pushed off your south side and moved north. Back pressed to Van's chest, you settled into his arms and let him kiss your neck and shoulders. It was the position you spent most bath time in. Close and intimate and exposed and safe.

As Van kissed, you ran your fingers along his arms wrapped around you. When you were little, you dreamed of a relationship like that. One with no borders between your body and theirs. One where every part of you was something to love and every part of them was something to worship. Every curve. Every stretch mark. Every fingernail. Every shadow under every eye. Everything. It had always seemed impossible… or maybe just unobtainable. But then there was Van. Rather than it necessarily being a sign of maturity or altruism, it was more that Van didn't give a fuck about what the world thought. Yeah, out there in society thighs don't touch, but when yours did it was just a normal thing. Normal and healthy and good. And, aren't girls meant to be polished and smooth at all times? Not according to Van. There's more important things to worry about than the hair on your girlfriend's body; things like how to make her toes curl and how to stop her crying when she's upset. Those kinds of things, you know?

"Van?"

"Mmm?"

"Sing?"

He nodded into you and went through the catalogue in his head of your favourite songs. As he settled on Stealing Cars by James Bay and the melodic a capella lyrics filled all the empty space in the bathroom, the sound bouncing off the kinda-clean white subway tiles that seemed weirdly modern in the context of the rest of the house, you melted into Van even more.

Turning your neck just enough to reach him, you nudged Van's face with your nose, aiming for attention. He stopped singing to you. "Hi," he whispered.

"Hi."

You kissed him small and soft. Just a peak. Then another and another and another, until he was grinning and squeezing you tight enough that you squeaked. He chuckled to himself, and you kissed him properly. Deeply. Lovingly.

The pebbles on the path from the street to your front door roasted in the sun. They burnt the feet of the little field mice that tried to run over it, searching for sanctuary in the cool bottoms of your garden's bushes. The bitumen of the road melted and children across the town imagined car tyres sticking to it and melding together in a lava-like tarry mess. It was the hottest day in years and years, but in the bathroom of the house owned by you and Van, you may as well have been on a different planet.

Cuddling in the bath, biting at each other's lips and wrestling for control of the hand holding, nothing beyond the bathroom door mattered much at all.


End file.
